Browse Items (9 total)

In January 1975, the National Commission on the Observance of International Women's Year was a presidential commission established by President Gerald Ford. The purpose of the commission was to work in conjunction with the International Women’s Year…

Arthur Robert Ashe was one of the greatest tennis players in American history and a noted human rights activist. He was the first and to date is the only Black man to win the singles title in three Grand Slam tennis events--the U.S. Open (1968), the…

On the morning of September 11, 2001, four flights were hijacked by members of the Islamic extremist group, al- Qaeda, in a coordinated attack against the United States. All four hijacked planes were scheduled to be cross-country flights from the…

Governor Mark Warner signed the Emergency Preparedness Executive Order on Jan. 31, 2002. The order launched the Secure Virginia Initiative, established the Secure Virginia Panel, directed state agencies to prepare or update emergency response plans,…

Congress passed the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990 to protect people with disabilities from discrimination. In 1999 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Olmstead v. L.C. that the ADA prohibits unnecessary segregation of mentally ill or…

Lawrence Douglas Wilder (1931–  ) made history more than once in Virginia, and became the first Black US governor to serve a state since Reconstruction. The grandson of enslaved people, Doug Wilder attended racially segregated public schools in…

Despite the ratification of both the Fifteenth and Nineteenth Amendments that granted all adult citizens in the United States the right to vote, many eligible Black voters in southern states were systematically blocked from participating in the…

On the morning of September 11, 2001, members of the Islamic extremist group al-Qaeda launched a coordinated attack against the United States. They hijacked four planes scheduled to be cross-country flights from the East Coast to California. American…

The annual payment of tribute by Virginia's Indians has been a long-standing practice that still occurs today. In 1646, Necotowance, "the King of the Indians" as the English referred to him, signed a treaty to end the third Anglo-Indian War. Annual…